Huh? We have solar panels for our relatively large house, they are much smaller, and they were the cheapest ones to buy and install. And they power it.
But solar panels will pay them selves off in 10-30 years because now a days they can produce enough energy to power a house and still have extra energy which can be sold back to power companies. Where as the wars in Iraq and Afghanistan won't.
Then you tap into the grid. In Germany, 5.2% of their electricity comes from solar power, and it can get mighty cloudy in Germany. Also, solar power creates a surplus, which is then pumped back into the power grid, which the power company will then pay you for. It's kind of a win-win, after the initial cost.
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· 9 years ago
Because in some places the sun goes down or early, or sometimes it gets stormy. Also it would put lots of workers out of business because if it did work it might run the energy companies out of business.
All this is, is like fronting decades of electrical bills upfront... I'd rather spend our money on nuclear energy. You know, something that can -actually- reduce electrical costs ten fold and help improve the environment by reducing dependency on coal/natural gas...while also allowing us to safely rid the world of nuclear warheads. Just saying...
Do you realize how expensive nuclear energy is compared to basically anything else? Also nuclear energy creates radioactive waste and frankly isn't much of a step up from coal. Solar is literally (directly or indirectly) the source of all life and energy on earth. Why would we build our own nuclear reactors when we already have a ridiculously big one called the sun that produces ridiculously cheap power?
Nuclear is right in line with all other major forms of power production /kwh
Yes, solar/hydro are "cheaper" but they can't compete on the large scale that we need, its currently impossible and that is not likely to change within 100+ years. Right now we get 0.3% of our power from solar...the goal is to get that to 1.5% by ~2025. Tell me, where do you want the other 98.5% of your power to come from? I think a reactor which creates adundent CLEAN energy, yes, clean. Every new reactor design has been built to reuse the waste of old reactors, thus eliminating the radioactive "waste" you speak of. People hear "nuclear" and instantly their minds go to meltdowns and environmental hazards which are realistically no longer major concerns with the built in fail safes we currently have and are continuing to improve on.
I'm not saying solar is "bad", its just not a viable option and is not expected to be for centuries. Whereas we HAVE a viable option with continued nuclear power production.
Plus solar/wind need backup generators...either fed by coal or natural gas to power themselves when there's no sun/wind. Which drastically increases their cost.
I think you need to do you own research to education yourself more on the pros vs cons of the various energy sources. I have, in school and outside, and have come to MY conclusion that nuclear is our best option currently.
They lose efficency so quickly they become useless within ten years and need to be replaced. So that's 3 trillion every 10 years. Not cheap. Plus they are only 3% efficient to begin with.
Money needed for solar panels(base on number of homes in 2012) 3.125 trillion. This is without installation prices
Yes, solar/hydro are "cheaper" but they can't compete on the large scale that we need, its currently impossible and that is not likely to change within 100+ years. Right now we get 0.3% of our power from solar...the goal is to get that to 1.5% by ~2025. Tell me, where do you want the other 98.5% of your power to come from? I think a reactor which creates adundent CLEAN energy, yes, clean. Every new reactor design has been built to reuse the waste of old reactors, thus eliminating the radioactive "waste" you speak of. People hear "nuclear" and instantly their minds go to meltdowns and environmental hazards which are realistically no longer major concerns with the built in fail safes we currently have and are continuing to improve on.
I'm not saying solar is "bad", its just not a viable option and is not expected to be for centuries. Whereas we HAVE a viable option with continued nuclear power production.
I think you need to do you own research to education yourself more on the pros vs cons of the various energy sources. I have, in school and outside, and have come to MY conclusion that nuclear is our best option currently.
That's probably why...